Due Process, Even on College Campuses

Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos is soon to release specifics on a major policy change.

Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos is soon to release specifics on a major policy change to restore due process to the handling of sexual misconduct charges of within the world of education. This change is necessary to end college and university administrators from trampling due process by automatically assuming guilt when allegations of sexual assault are made.

Imagine you’re accused of sexual misconduct and your accuser has made serious statements about you publicly that will certainly ruin your reputation and, in most cases, your ability to move up in the world, both personally and professionally. If the alleged act(s) occur in the workplace, community, or a church, these charges are filed in court and treated as criminal in nature, but the burden of proof is on the accuser. Should you be found guilty, then jail time, a criminal record featuring a felony (depending on the offense), and possible restitution are in your future.

However, if this is your story and your accuser is a student, as of 2011, your chances of having your side of the story heard are greatly diminished. In other words, if you’re accused in a campus or student-related sexual assault, the protections of the Constitution currently are not afforded fully to you.

Obviously, sexual misconduct — whether rape, assault, or unwanted advances — is wrong and should be punished. If every situation fell into the clearly defined category of either consensual or nonconsensual, this would not be a problem. But that isn’t the case. The unfortunate reality of the modern feminist backlash is that a mob now wants to destroy the “patriarchy” and “toxic masculinity,” no matter what the truth may be.

This approach to “justice” began in 2011 during Barack Obama’s administration via a “Dear Colleague” letter. The 19-page “guidance” was a directive to supplement the Office of Civil Rights’ Revised Sexual Harassment Guidance from 2001. This informal-yet-binding supplement greatly expanded the role and reach of an educational institution when a student was involved in an alleged act of sexual misconduct.

On page four, the directive notes that even if a student complains of an alleged act that “initially occurred off school grounds, outside a school’s education program or activity,” the school “may have an obligation to respond.” So an educational institution is to take jurisdiction in dealing with an alleged crime even if that act occurred off its property, outside a school-sanctioned event or activity, and should be beyond its scope of control. If the alleged victim is an elementary student or a minor, it’s understandable that a reporting of an alleged assault would occur. Yet, without a designation, the letter establishes that an adult student falls into this broadly written policy to assume some liability and jurisdiction in dealing with potentially criminal behavior, even when off-campus.

Keep reading the seven-year-old Obama administration letter that gave excessive and inappropriate powers to schools and you’ll find, on page 12, the reason these quasi-courts present a real problem on college campuses, where alcohol, drugs, and promiscuity are found easily. Verbatim, the federal directive reads, “OCR strongly discourages schools from allowing the parties personally to question or cross-examine each other during the hearing. Allowing an alleged perpetrator to question an alleged victim directly may be traumatic or intimidating, thereby possibly escalating or perpetuating a hostile environment.”

Because it may be traumatic, the accused, regardless of extenuating circumstances, may not be afforded the opportunity to present his version of events and challenge the alleged victim’s account. Assuredly, this is because all who are accused are guilty, right?

One of the most memorable, and still vivid, examples of how the right of due process is important dates to 2006, when the Duke lacrosse team hired a student from North Carolina Central College to strip for them at a party. Most folks could conclude this was already a bad idea. This case would now easily fall under the jurisdiction of the Obama way of handling sexual misconduct through colleges.

Three men were identified and alleged to have raped the female student who had agreed to be part of their evening. Nothing about this is good, so let’s not pretend that anyone walks away from this original scene as virtuous. After the case was tried in the court of public opinion based on race and class warfare, the evidence in court remained insufficient — yet reputations were forever damaged. All accused were not found guilty and the prosecutor was disbarred and served jail time for his mishandling of the case. Still, thank goodness for due process.

More recently, Rolling Stone magazine ran a 9,000-word exposé about the supposed “rape culture” at the University of Virginia with an extensive account of one female, “Jackie,” who allegedly had been forced into performing sex acts on five fraternity brothers. To avoid trauma or retaliation, the reporter “decided to honor her request not to contact the man she claimed orchestrated the attack nor any of the men who she claimed participated in the attack.” Rolling Stone, after protests and the production by the accused fraternity of information that refuted the claims, had to issue a retraction noting discrepancies in the “victim’s” story. And, yes, an apology was issued “to anyone who was affected by the story.” Awww, so kind.

Every one of the accused had to obtain a lawyer and live in fear and public scrutiny, but, “Gee, sorry. Oops.”

Whenever Secretary DeVos does provide the changes to policy that are currently under review, it will be a defeat to the Left’s approach of political correctness while restoring due process on campus. While it remains that a very real toxicity lies in mixing substances that inhibit the conscience and control of adults in situations that can escalate quickly and have serious consequences, Rule of Law through due process must always hold true.

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It's Time to Hold America's 'Educators' to Account

Arnold Ahlert

Last week, in an effort to blame a president for his administration's failings before a disaster occurred, a Washington Post editorial stated that Donald Trump is "complicit" with a hurricane. Such a statement should set off alarm bells, but not for its pathetically inane level of political bias. That the Post would not only consider such an editorial for publication but actually publish it is a testament to the pitiful state of American education. And it's time for Trump to demand a Republican-controlled Congress hold nationally televised congressional hearings to deal with what has become an existential threat to our republic.

According to dictionary.com, the definition of complicit is "choosing to be involved in an illegal or questionable act, especially with others." Thus, the Post's editorial board is asserting that the president of the United States and a storm are partners in crime. It is impossible to believe the board isn't fully aware that such an assertion is a complete non-sequitur. Nor can we be expected to believe they seriously think that if Trump only fell into line with the progressive worldview and kept America in the economy-crushing Paris Accord, that Hurricane Florence would either not exist, or would have turned to sea instead of making landfall.

We suppose it's worth something that at least the editors knew the word "collusion" was spent.

How contemptuous of the American public's acumen are the Post's editors? Last February, the same paper revealed that many nations who signed the Paris Accord are failing to meet its goals. Moreover, the U.S. is currently the world leader in cutting CO2 emissions. Thus, one can conclude the most reasonable motive for publishing such unadulterated garbage is the editorial board's smug conclusion that a mis-educated public will buy it.

Their contempt is hardly unique. "Today's ruling class, from Boston to San Diego, was formed by an educational system that exposed them to the same ideas and gave them remarkably uniform guidance, as well as tastes and habits," writes former Select Committee on Intelligence member Angelo Codevilla. "These amount to a social canon of judgments about good and evil, complete with secular sacred history, sins (against minorities and the environment), and saints. Using the right words and avoiding the wrong ones when referring to such matters — speaking the 'in' language — serves as a badge of identity."

And what kind of education do ordinary Americans get? "For our K-12 school system, an honorary membership in the Third World," writes columnist F.H. Buckley.

This divide produces immense polarization between a ruling class that believes it is entitled to rule — irrespective of elections — and an American public they believe is "retrograde, racist, and dysfunctional unless properly constrained," as Codevilla puts it.

Codevilla wrote that piece in 2010. Last week, video of a post-election meeting of Google leadership and employees revealed the utter contempt these self-appointed Masters of the Universe have for anyone who runs afoul of the progressive social canon. Moreover, company co-founder Sergey Brin and CEO Sundar Pichai refer to project "Jigsaw," which was an effort to use their search engine — the one with a 90.88% worldwide market share — to redirect "extremists" to content tailored to change their opinions.

Extremists according to whom?

Google's arrogance is matched by Twitter. The social media service that both exploits and epitomizes America's increasing infatuation with semi-literate communication has determined the highly accurate term "illegal alien" — used in federal law and at the Supreme Court — violates its "Hateful Content" policy.

Unfortunately, both companies are plowing fertile soil, courtesy of a unionized educational cartel that is a de facto arm of the Democrat Party. This contemptible decades-long alliance has turned America's classrooms into dumbed-down, progressive indoctrination factories.

It's time for a national accounting. For example, it would be highly illuminating to put officials at John F. Kennedy High School in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, on national TV and ask why they are teaching students a gender-bending, anti-white worldview, courtesy of a "Diversity Toolkit" that contains a confidentiality clause that keeps inquiring parents at bay. Or maybe a Vernon, New Jersey, middle school teacher could explain why she skipped commemorating Sept. 11 to teach a fictionalized account of a Muslim boy bullied because his name was Osama. Maybe officials in numerous cities and states who boast of increasing graduation rates could explain why a whopping 40-60% of high school "graduates" need remediation classes in English or math — or both — before entering college. Or why only 36% percent of eighth-graders are proficient in reading, and only 34% are proficient in math.

How is failing to teach more than six in 10 children basic skills — year after year — even remotely acceptable?

Because it aligns with the American Left's long-term strategy, which is now bearing fruit: When one turns out a sufficient number of semi-literate, semi-numerate, and ultimately government-dependent students — the majority of whom are contemptuous of a nation they know next to nothing about in terms of civics, history or the Constitution — an increasing infatuation with socialism, and countless other permutations of a "by any means necessary" agenda, including the effort to unseat a duly elected president, become eminently reasonable.

The deleterious effect on the nation has never been clearer. The orchestrated ignorance is profound, enduring — and multi-generational.

Thus in Hollywood, a community that once turned out thoughtful, well-constructed, clever, literate and oftentimes pro-American entertainment now floods the nation with a degenerative sludge-fest of anti-intellectual detritus, often accompanied by moronic moralizing.

Our universities have become de facto kindergartens, where social justice warriors make the now seamless transition from their helicopter parents (educated by the same system) and "everyone gets a trophy" lifestyles to campuses replete with safe spaces, trigger warnings, and utter contempt for the First and Second Amendments, all enabled by cowardly or complicit administrators.

Corporations have abandoned sensible business practices for leftist-oriented virtue-signaling policies that alienate customers. Moreover they embrace monocultural hiring and firing practices that amount to nothing more than political blacklisting.

And as for what Codevilla called our uniform ruling class, a public-be-damned lack of statesmanship, and a boundless level of self-interest are its two most "uniform" characteristics.

Nonetheless, nationally televised congressional hearings are the best vehicle for staging the battle to save the nation. It is one of the few venues where the filter of an equally corrupt mainstream media is least likely to be imposed — and where the rogue's galley of scam artists, activists, and propagandists purporting to be educators can and must be taken to task in no uncertain terms.

The public must be made to understand that every serious problem with which this nation is afflicted has education as its common denominator, and that "sunlight" — as in the white-hot lights of national TV exposure — is the best disinfectant.

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Students with record-low High School leaving scores will soon be teaching Australian kids: Secret report reveals bottom-of-the-class pupils are being encouraged to be TEACHERS

Students with the lowest scores at high school are being encouraged to take up jobs as teachers.

Some students with zero scores in university admission tests are being offered places in teaching degrees, according to a secret report.

The figures show that in NSW and the ACT there were 28 offers made to students who scored between zero and 19 in the Australian Tertiary Admission Rank, the criteria for undergraduate university programs in all states except Queensland.

The figures were revealed by retired professor John Mack, who released the figures to the ABC despite the University of Sydney requesting the secret report be destroyed.

Professor Mack said it was not in the interest of the universities to reveal the information. 'What it shows is that overall the general quality of applicants has gone down,' he said.

'In some cases it was worrying that offers were being made to some students that I would have thought would have had exceptional difficulty coping with first-year university.'

The University of Sydney said it was 'very disappointed' with the release of the report.

'We are currently considering whether the release of this report now constitutes a breach of our policies and processes and will take appropriate action if it does,' the university said in a statement to Daily Mail Australia.

'At the time the report was written, we communicated with the researchers involved, UAC and the NSW Vice-Chancellors’ Committee to ensure research produced by our academics meets both UAC’s protocols for data use and ethics requirements, as well as our own policy requirements, before being made public.'

University of Sydney lecturer Rachel Wilson - who co-wrote the report with Professor Mack - said there were 'disturbing indicators' showing declining performance at high schools.

'There are very clear trends, I would say disturbingly steep trends, in the admission of lower-attaining students to initial teacher education,' she said. 'And if the system doesn't rise up and address this issue we are going to be in a downward spiral from here on in.'

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